Whither Knives?

(Original image here.)

Okay, that's a good question.  Why a radio show about knives?

It's not like Self Help Radio hasn't explored other cutlery before.  While still not daring to examine the elusive fork, a healthy discussion about spoons was attempted almost seven years ago to this day.  What makes the dining table such a difficult subject?

Indeed, one can argue that knives themselves transcend the mere act of eating, for they are used for other things - cutting things, killing things, being thrown, among others.  Should this show be lumped in, therefore, to the cutlery category?  Wait, is there a cutlery category?

& isn't "cutlery" one of those words that, if you say or look at them too much, stops to seem less like a word & more like a collection of nonsense syllables?  At some point I started to believe it was spelled "cutlerly," & then I started to imagine what actions one might do in a cutlerly manner.  At times it felt like a knife was carving away vital segments of my brain.

Honestly, the "knife as metaphor" proved too attractive one fateful night.  I was still in Lexington, I believe.  The lights were low, which turned out to be a bad idea, as I was chopping onions.  Two or three seconds later I was covering my newly-sliced finger with a paper towel & trying to figure out when the wife had hidden the band-aids.  Even then, I didn't settle upon the theme, no.  It was later, when I accidentally wrote a poem on the back of iPad (it was still dark) in which I said, "My life is a knife that never cuts what it's supposed to cut."

While I was cleaning the nail polish off the back of my iPad (don't ask), I recognized the words I had written in the middle of the night.  Did I say out loud, to the waiting world, "This shall be a theme for another episode of Self Help Radio?"  Did I frighten my cats & dogs by holding the iPad high above my head & exclaiming, "The show is saved for one more week for We. Have. A. Theme!!"  Did I rush to find a bottle of wine to drink a toast to the Muse, who for whatever reason can't just be direct but has to speak to me in symbol & circumstance?  Did I do all three?

Probably not, but I did think it'd be a good theme.  Will it?  You can decide yourself if you want by listening to tonight's show on from 9-11 pm EST (8-10pm CST) on 93.9 fm WLXU in Lexington or online at Lexington Community Radio dot org.  I'll tweet along.  Wanna listen?

It's perfectly safe!  All the knives will be in the music!